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A Final Fantasy XIII-2 review
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holdthephone
United States523 Posts
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wonderwall
New Zealand695 Posts
Fielding the message much more gracefully is the universe itself, with XIII-2 rserving a respectable piece of its predecessor's beautiful presentation. You have angered the spell checking monster, prepare to die. The sappy nature of Final Fantasy is all still there, of course, the best and the worst of it. Serah is quite sincere in a warm way, and Noel's cheesy, Tom Cruise like aura can easily bring out the occasional smirk. But unfortunately, eyes will surely roll to the ceiling whenever Lightning speaks, often having to chime in with a solemn monologue at the end of each scene, narrating from the beyond in some awful kind of poetry. That's 6 commas in 3 sentences. What you write becomes easier to read when you focus on short, simple sentences. The same applies with using hyphens to splice in bits of text. The structure seems slightly all over the place with points coming in as you thought of them. Create maybe 5 main categories that you're going to focus on and follow them in order. As an example, Plot-Gameplay-Characters-New Additions-Audio and then a summation. Having a logical progression makes your writing easier to follow. Still a good review though. It's a fun game and it sounds like you enjoyed it in spite of its flaws. | ||
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nakedsurfer
Canada500 Posts
I havn't done any sidequests at all really so far besides trying to get 100% map while im at that destination if possible(usually isnt the first time) so I should be overleveled for where I am in the story but then again maybe the real challenges will be the side quests when I get to them. Also I'm not sure if once you beat it that theres an option for a harder difficuly..some games do that sometime so I guess I'll see about that one. I havn't played with the infusion of monsters really yet either so I havn't really seen a huge point to it yet. If done correctly, i'm guessing the game will just be even more easier at some points? anyways I will probably restart a game once I get all the missions done(side quests and story) Just to replay it slower since I was really intrigued with the story. Again I give it 9/10 just because it's a sequal but then again i'm hoping for a great ending and nothing too corny like the ending for ff-XIII (though it did end up becoming a pretty nice opener for this one) EDIT: Just for the record, ever since FF-XIII I Hate with a passion the "auto-ability" thing they put in and I refuse to do it ever. I always pick my commands. It seems so silly to play a game that you end up just walking around and everytime in battle you just pick the set-up and let everything else to the AI. | ||
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Enki
United States2548 Posts
I think all the sidequests and stuff is to make up for XIIIs complete lack of them, unless you count those shitty monster hunting ones that you get from finding Cieth stones. | ||
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Paraietta
United Kingdom130 Posts
I agree with a lot of the points you raised about the characters and exposition. Even for a final fantasy game, the dialogue is ridiculously cheesy and repetitive. Despite only having about 10 hours of gameplay clocked up it's pretty frustrating to jump through a gate, have ANOTHER inane back-and-forth between Noel and Actually, although the dialogue choice options are pretty entertaining, I thin they present a real stumbling block for character development. I mean, we establish our ideas about a given character based upon their reactions and responses in certain situations, but the dialogue choice options remove all that potential for character development by allowing me to choose the most stupid and inappropriate response to every situation. BUT that said, my impression of the game so far is that they answered the criticisms of FFXIII head-on. One of my main problems with FFXIII was the retarded illusion of choice that was presented by the crystarium. It wasn't flexible enough to rival the sphere grid from FFX, which was a great system, and had a ridiculous artificial level cap until certain plot milestones were reached, just so you couldn't become too strong. At least the crystarium now presents you with some actual choices that will have an effect on the game. Like you said, some of the options are clearly better than others, but I wouldn't expect everyone who plays this game to figure that out. I mean come on, when I was 9 years old I didn't figure out that in FFVIII you're supposed to refine curagas and tornados in the first few hours of the game, junction them to health and attack, never fight any random battles and then proceed to be pretty much indestructible for the rest of the game. So in that respect I think FFXIII-2 succeeds, the game mechanics feel a lot deeper than its predecessor and even at this stage I can already think of some things I'd like to do differently on a second playthrough. So perhaps it represents what FFX-2 was to FFX. Abandoning all hope of a serious story and characters in favour of FUN AS FUCK gameplay. Oh, and jumping too. | ||
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holdthephone
United States523 Posts
@nakedsurfer: Don't worry, I don't put spoilers in reviews -- doesn't make much sense! Thanks for the feedback though, glad to hear you're enjoying it. As for the Auto-option, it' there so you can focus on paradigm shifting, which is very demanding in tougher battles. Without the Auto button, the games would fall apart. @Enki: I have to say, even though the concept was trivial with XIII's end-game hunting missions, they were by far the most intense encounters in the game and a great way to break in a fully maxed battle party. I recommend going back to them if you had skipped it. @Paraietta : Once again, no spoilers are in the review, lol. The dialogue choice are meant to be taken lightly, either as humor or an opportunity to brush up on information. It's not like a Dragon Age or Mass Effect where the player is actually in the shoes of someone else. Thanks for the responses guys. | ||
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DreamChaser
1649 Posts
Nice review over all though | ||
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ZoW
United States3983 Posts
It's a monster collector's favorite hunting spot, a trailblazer's backpack of spoils, and a completionist's paradise. Cameos and salutes to older games abound, challenges to truly test those thirsty for battle await, and powerful skills and items lie in hiding -- this is a gamer's game, and it's damn well appreciated. hmmm that line kinda maks me interested. are there monster arena/super bosses like emerald/ruby/omega weapon in XIII-2? i'm still kinda skeptical about the game itself though, didn't like orignial XIII at all. i'll probably pick this up whenever it dips under 40 bucks or so if the aforementioned is in it. | ||
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holdthephone
United States523 Posts
@ZoW: If you didn't enjoy XIII, I'd definitely hold off until the price dips on XIII-2. The extra battles are indeed pretty epic challenges, and there are arena encounters and more DLC bosses to come. But if the battle system was not to your liking, there may not be much incentive to pick this one up. | ||
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ZoW
United States3983 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/vHSEP.jpg) | ||
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holdthephone
United States523 Posts
So XIII-2 gives much more for the player to branch off to, but also loses a powerful narrative along the way, as many more open games tend to do. | ||
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nakedsurfer
Canada500 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + At first, Serah and Noah talk about how he wanted to die there because all the yeuls would live in Valhalla where there is no time or life/death. So they think he ended up listening to what Noah said and ended up being a good guy. But in reality all he really wanted was to destroy time whether he did it or the gates of Chaos did it(Lightning realizes this and gives up since if she kills him he wins and if he end time himself he wins.). You also think, oh the future changed finally(once the gates closed so theres no other possibility for the future to change) so Sarah dies. But then he see what happens and they requote what caius said. It also makes you think that Noah probably could have never been the next guardian. Even when Caius was training Noah to kill him in Noah's past(Future) it was probably to open the gates of chaos and Noah was never going to become the next guardian. Also, Yeul tries to warn them in the last place but it sounds like such a trick since you never really think about the part where he says if you make his heart stop beating then it'll open the gates. Pretty damn good for a Final Fantasy ending I must say....and it's not even ended. Big downside though is if the next one sucks shit then even though this is was great, it would kind of make this one suck. | ||
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KazeHydra
Japan2788 Posts
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